How Toronto Got Its Name: The Leading Accounts

Every time you say “Toronto,” you are saying a word that began at a narrow channel of fish weirs near present-day Orillia.

This is one of those stories where the sources agree on a lot and differ on a little. We lay out the leading accounts side by side and say who says what.

What does Toronto mean?

The most widely cited answer comes from a Mohawk word. The Canadian Encyclopedia says the name Toronto is derived from the Mohawk word tkaronto, which means “where there are trees standing in the water.” Natural Resources Canada describes it as an Iroquois term meaning “where there are trees in water,” in reference to a weir for catching fish.

Others phrase it a little differently, and that is worth noticing. Toronto Public Library’s reconciliation statement gives Tkaronto as “the place in the water where the trees are standing” in the Mohawk language. The City of Toronto’s Port Lands naming report says the city’s name derives from the Haudenosaunee word Tkaronto, with the same meaning, and thought to refer to fishing weirs carbon-dated to over 4,000 years old. Same root, several careful English renderings.

Where was the first “Toronto”?

Not here. The word originally referred to The Narrows, near present-day Orillia, where the Wendat and other groups drove stakes into the water to create fish weirs. The Globe and Mail reported in 2003 that, according to a language expert it interviewed, the word originally referred to a place now called Atherley Narrows.

The place is recognized today. The Mnjikaning Fish Weirs were designated a national historic site of Canada in 1982, and Parks Canada describes wooden fish weirs in use from about 3300 B.C. Parks Canada also says the Huron-Wendat cared for and used the site in the centuries immediately before 1650 A.D., and that today the Huron-Wendat and Anishinaabeg are its stewards.

The Chippewas of Rama First Nation add a human picture. They say many First Nations from all over travelled to the Mnjikaning fish weirs every year to fish, trade and meet on important issues, and that the weirs were neutral territory.

How did the name travel south?

Gradually, along routes people already used. French maps from the 1680s to the 1760s identify present-day Lake Simcoe as Lac de Taronto, and the spelling changed to Toronto during the 18th century. The term then gradually came to refer to a large region that included the location of the present-day City of Toronto.

The land route matters too. The Canadian Encyclopedia describes the Carrying Place Trail as a portage route running 45 km from Lake Ontario to Lake Simcoe, following the Humber and Holland Rivers. It also notes that the Toronto Passage on Lake Ontario, known by the native people as the Carrying Place Trail, was the site of Fort Rouillé.

Natural Resources Canada agrees on the shape of the journey: Toronto gradually came to refer to a larger region that includes the site of the present city.

What about the “meeting place” story?

It is the popular alternative, and sources treat it differently. The Globe and Mail reported in 2003 that the idea, that the Huron people called the place where the city now rests a “meeting place,” appears widely, and that a language expert it quoted said most scholars now trace the name to Mohawk tkaronto. That expert, Dr. Steckley, was described as an expert in native languages who speaks Huron. The same report traced the meeting-place reading to the 19th-century historian Henry Scadding and his 1884 book, which cited a 17th-century French missionary’s translation of a Huron word, toronton, as roughly “there is a lot.”

So here is the fair summary. The “trees in the water” account, traced to Mohawk and the wider Iroquoian and Haudenosaunee languages, is the one given by the Canadian Encyclopedia, Natural Resources Canada, Toronto Public Library and the City of Toronto. The meeting-place account is still widely repeated, and the Globe’s expert questioned it.

There is a charming overlap worth noting without over-reading it. The weirs at The Narrows were, in Rama’s words, a place where many nations met on important issues. The name and the gathering place are separate stories, and we do not claim one explains the other.

When did York become Toronto again?

The Town of York was founded on August 27, 1793 by Lieutenant-Governor John Graves Simcoe. On March 6, 1834, York was incorporated as the City of Toronto. Royal assent was given that day to an act to extend the limits of the town, erect it into a city, and incorporate it under the name of the City of Toronto.

Toronto Public Library notes that the incorporated city reverted to its earlier name of Toronto, derived from an Iroquoian term. Here is our smile of the day: fifty years later, on March 6, 1884, the city’s semi-centennial celebrations included the official opening of Toronto Public Library.

What other names live on this land?

Many. The City’s Port Lands report says the Petun, the Wendat, the Haudenosaunee and the Anishinaabeg have all made their homes here and have many names for the weirs found at places like The Narrows. Toronto Public Library says the land is the traditional territory of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy, the Wendat, and the Mississaugas of the Credit First Nation.

The Mississaugas of the Credit First Nation’s own site gives Anishinaabe names for local waterways: Adoopekog, “place of the alders,” now Etobicoke Creek, and Wonscotonach, “back burnt grounds,” the Don River. The next time you cross a bridge, you may be crossing a name.

Where can you keep reading?

Our history of Toronto guide gathers the whole series. For a name from the same era, read how Yonge Street got its name, then how Spadina got its name, and a streetful of others in how Toronto’s streets got their names.

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